CS informed of anomaly hampering development agenda

‘Over 2,000 employees’ shortfall affecting working of LGs in KP’

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government's agenda of bringing about a "change" at the grassroots level is yet to fully take off as the local bodies' institutions in the province are facing a shortfall of over 2000 officers and officials among other deficiencies.

The Local Government Elections and Rural Development Department (LGE&RDD) has already informed the quarters concerned of the anomaly that among other shortcomings has also led to the low utilization of development funds of the Local Government (LG) institutions such as district, village and neighbourhood councils and Tehsil and Town Municipals administrations (TMAs).

A document available with The News has shown that the human resource shortfall that is going to turn the whole local governance regime into a fiasco including the vacant posts from grade-20 to the basic pay scale (BPS-1) positions.

The document has been lined up as presentation to Chief Secretary Muhammad Azam Khan, who has prodded the bureaucracy to shed its proverbial lethargy and pursue the reforms agenda of the provincial government more efficiently.

Azam Khan soon after taking over as chief secretary on September 14 directed the administrative departments to provide data on the development projects, status of the staff and legal cases that are hampering their official working.

To further expedite the agenda of early and efficient service delivery, the chief secretary also carried out extensive reshuffles in bureaucracy and around fifty officers holding significant posts have been shuffled over the last one month.

Azam Khan's policy of pushing the bureaucracy has apparently worked and most of 34 departments and directorates have started coming up with the data highlighting inadequacies and deficiencies affecting their working.

The LGE&RDD has informed the chief secretary that the department was facing a shortfall of around 2079 employees that also included 21 vacant positions in the secretariat and 2058 vacancies at the local governance institutions at various levels.

It said the sanctioned strength of the LG secretariat is 83 staffer including two positions of grade-20, one grade-19, three grade-18, fourteen positions of grade-17 and nineteen posts of grade-16.

However, 62 of these positions at the moment are filled, while 21 positions are still vacant at the secretariat level that also include one grade-19, five each positions of grade-17 and 16.

It also informed that the field offices of the department, including Local Areas Authorities (LAAs), Local Council Board (LCB), Director General Local Government (DGLG), are facing shortfall of 2058 that turned to be a huge anomaly affecting working of the local governance institutions.

The document suggests that the sanctioned positions in these offices come to 11921, including posts from grade-20 to BSP-1 and around 2058 of these positions are still vacant. These vacant posts include two grade-20 posts, 13 grade-19 posts, 48 grade-18, 144 grade-17 and 186 positions of grade-16.

The document further shows that 407 posts of the Village Councils (VCs) and Neighbourhood Councils (NCs) secretaries were also lying vacant over the last two years.

The department informed that rules have yet not been finalized for DG LG and for the first time in the history of the province the case of LCB vacant positions has been sent to Public Service Commission (PSC), while the Establishment and Administration Department (E&A) has time and ageing been asked provide officers for the secretariat positions.

The document also indicated that the case of 118 officers recently requisitioned by the department is also pending with the PSC that include 40 Tehsil Municipal Officers (TMOs), 19 Assistant TMOs, 19 Tehsil Officers (TOs), four infrastructure officers, 16 sub-engineers, eight account officers and 12 accountants.